Launch of The Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction

08 June 2009, UNESCO Paris, Room IV

UNESCO is launching the first global report uncovering how disaster risk is intensively concentrated in a very small portion of the earth’s surface and unevenly distributed.

Based on more than 30 years of disaster data, the report highlights three main risk drivers that will be magnified by climate change and proposes 20 recommendations to help make the world safer.

The launch will aim to focus global media and political attention on the problem of disaster risk and to strengthen countries' commitment to reduce the loss of life, livelihoods and economic assets through natural disasters.

The Report provides hard-hitting evidence to demonstrate how, where and why disaster risk is increasing globally and presents key findings from a global analysis of disaster risk patterns and trends, including where high mortality and economic loss is concentrated. The report analyses the underlying factors that are increasing risk levels and reviews countries progress in achieving the Hyogo Framework for Action, the international framework for reducing disaster risk adopted by 168 governments in 2005.

Using documented best practices from around the world, the Report shows that it is possible to address the underlying factors that are increasing disaster risk and worsening poverty and calls for a renewed national and international commitment to reducing disaster risk, highlights aspects of the Hyogo Framework of Action that need greater attention and provides practical recommendations to assist countries realign their policy and institutional frameworks for disaster risk reduction. The report is a collaborative biennial effort undertaken by UN agencies and partners, member states, the World Bank, regional inter-governmental and technical institutions, civil society networks, academic institutions and other ISDR system partners to guide policy formulation in disaster risk reduction.